"(novel) (ebook) - Perry Rhodan 0011 - (5b) Mutants in Action" - читать интересную книгу автора (Perry Rhodan)

However, the Topide had no intention of letting two dangerous looking objects approach him so closely. When the distance between them was still more than 40,000 miles, Deringhouse saw a glistening ray beam shoot toward him. He felt his ship’s frame vibrate but didn’t change his course. The shot passed close by."Fire!" he said softly into the com mike.

The darting disintegrator rays reached out to the alien ship. On the visiscreen, Deringhouse saw the vessels outline blur. The shining point of light disappeared, to be replaced by a dull glowing cloud. Seconds later they shot past it and away.

"Bullseye!" he commented.

Klein countered with, "An clear!"

They pancaked into the upper layers of the Ferrol atmosphere. The dropping air speed indicators demonstrated the braking action of the air.

"Operating velocity, Mach 8," Deringhouse instructed.

It was the highest velocity that was sanely possible to fly at an altitude of six or seven miles. Ground to air defence rockets didn’t normally travel any faster than that. It wouldn’t be difficult for the fighters to dodge them under these conditions. Deringhouse regulated his drivers and peeled into a flat glide course at the indicated altitude. Klein joined him trimly at one hundred yards.The region below was clear of clouds. They saw green forestland and a few mountain ranges, which from this altitude seemed unusually flat, and in the centre of their visiscreens a fairly large city was discernible. Circling the city in an unusual curving pattern was a river that served Deringhouse as a good landmark while checking his map.

"Khelar-Het, on the Great Ocean Isthmus," he reported to Klein. "The coast is about 320 miles to the south. There’s about a 720 mile stretch of ocean between us and the northern coast of the central continent, where Thorta is located."Klein answered back promptly. "I make it altogether about fifteen minutes"

Owing to its damp climate the Isthmus was a very thinly populated area. On the continent sized land mass there were only a few cities. The largest one was Khelar-Het, which was just slipping off the edge of their screens. There was no trace of opposition here. Deringhouse was aware of a growing sense of apprehension. Undoubtedly their destruction of the Topidian ship had been observed, and all Topidian bases on Ferrol had probably gone on alert. Therefore, this relative calm was getting to him.

In the same moment, Klein announced, "Ground to air rockets at two o’clock!"Deringhouse saw them immediately—a swarm of tiny blips on his scanner screen, approaching with a very respectable velocity. Grimly, he pulled his ship up into a tight curve until he was shooting straight into the sky at top acceleration. The rocket missiles fell behind. Even if automatically guided—which they undoubtedly were—they were incapable of staying with an Arkonide fighter for more than a few seconds. Both ships reached an altitude of thirty miles before dipping back into horizontal flight and continuing toward the coast.Skimming low over the sea was a line of giant aircraft. The Earthmen could not tell whether they were Ferronian freight transports or Topidian troop transports, so they left them in peace. The reconnaissance cameras ran on uninterruptedly, so that much of the information that the two pilots had to bypass in the swiftness of their flight would be retrievable from the film records. The ocean raced away beneath them. The coast of the central continent appeared, and with it the giant city of Thorta, where the Thort had lived until the Topides drove him out.

The Red Palace alone constituted a small city, and Thorta was at least five times as large as any terrestrial metropolis. Joined to its southern extremity was the giant space launch and landing field. Its surface enclosed an area of some 3,600 square miles; however, the Topides had apparently decided to land their fleet in a less obvious location. Only a few of the rod shaped ships were to be seen—plus the giant ball of the stolen Arkonide spaceship.The scanner screen came alive with moving traces. Deringhouse studied their pattern and direction of flight for a moment and came to the conclusion that none of them were hostile. After all, it was to be expected that there would be some kind of air traffic over a city such as Thorta.

"We’ve picked up enough recon data on the city, I think," suggested Klein. "What now?"

"Down below to the spaceport. Let’s fry a few of those flying sausages!"Klein responded at once. In close paired formation the two fighters shot in from the sea toward the southern edge of the city and the spaceport. Deringhouse’s instruments locked onto the objectives, and when he was at firing altitude he let loose with the disintegrator. One of the Topidian ships burst into a swirling cloud of atomised particles, and sixty yards beyond it, a second ship met the same fate."Antiaircraft fire!" yelled Klein.

The ground to air missiles were dangerously close. Fired straight on from the eastern side of the field, they could be dodged only by overloading their propulsion drives beyond all safety factors. But it became apparent that the rocket bombardment was only a diversionary manoeuvre. While they were still observing the blips of the receding rockets, a pale disintegrator beam shot out at them from a battle station on board the giant battleship. The scanner screen left only a faint trace, and Deringhouse wasn’t even aware the shot had been fired until the moment he sensed that his ship was not responding to the control."Your left wing!" yelled Klein.

"What’s the matter?"

"It’s been sliced in half!"The two fighters climbed higher. Klein strove to follow Deringhouse’s reeling ship as best he could. The unintentional manoeuvre meanwhile provided a priceless advantage, in that it was impossible for even the automatic beam lock on device of a super disintegrator to follow the weaving movements of a wounded space fighter. Deringhouse had to fly by wire. The loss of half a wing wasn’t too disturbing to him. The fighter was only partially an aerodynamic craft; to a great extent it could dispense with airfoil assistance. He threw in full power and saw that the ship still didn’t respond to control."Something else is on the fritz," he mumbled—and then suddenly he discovered it.The drivers were sputtering out. He checked them several times and fought his controls until he had to believe the evidence. He stared at the velocity meter. The fighter was in free fall. When the gravitation of Ferrol overcame his original momentum, he would fall back.

"Get going!" gasped Klein.

"I can’t," answered Deringhouse, while regaining his calm. "Now listen— you fly back alone to Rofus. I’ll stay here. My drivers are gone, I could never make it. Understood?"

"We could land somewhere, and I could take you on board!" said Klein.

"Don’t be crazy!" Deringhouse growled at him. "You know that’s impossible. Tell Rhodan that I’ll attempt to fight it through. If possible I’ll try not to fall into the hands of the Topides. I’ll head south and get as close to Sicha country as I can."

"But—!"

"Get back to base!" Deringhouse bellowed. "No more arguments! That’s an order, Captain Klein!"After a choked pause, Klein answered, "Yes sir, Major!" And then, "Good luck!"

"Thanks!"

Deringhouse saw the undamaged fighter shoot vertically away. Seconds later it was only a blip on the scanner—then it disappeared. With a sigh he turned back to it’s own problem.The crippled ship climbed to an altitude of forty-eight miles before the momentum gave out. At the proper moment, Deringhouse tipped it over and dived to regain a control momentum. At about nine miles of altitude he was able to stabilize with the help of the other wing.

Thorta lay far behind him. The countryside below was marked by a maze of wide highways. He saw a large number of small cities, great industrial plants, and far on the horizon the blue-shimmering line of the mountains where the Sichas lived. The distance amounted to more than 240 miles, and he wouldn’t get that far. All he needed was to find an area where he could bail out without falling into the hands of a Topidian search party. The towns became fewer. Patches of forest began to appear, and the highways were fewer and farther apart, with less traffic.Deringhouse gritted his teeth and nursed the flier carefully eastward. It looked good so far. The highways became scarcer, and the forested areas were larger. A small town passed beneath him. Then he switched on the timing fuse of the disintegrator and struck the releasing mechanism of the cockpit ejector with his fist. There was a murderous inertial jolt that the neutralizer could no longer absorb, and Deringhouse blacked out for a few seconds.